[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 76 (Wednesday, May 19, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H3627-H3633]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           WHERE'S THE BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Broun) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Madam Speaker, during the 5-minute speeches 
just a few minutes ago, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte) was 
showing all of us this poster that he graciously made up: Where's the 
budget? That is what we will be talking about tonight because we have 
seen in this Congress this year that the leadership of the Congress is 
failing its responsibility, failing its duty, failing to bring us a 
budget.
  Now, we saw the President put together a budget that he presented to 
Congress several months ago. We will talk about that a little bit. But 
under the Constitution of the United States--and I carry a copy in my 
pocket because I believe in this document as it was intended by the 
Founders, the people who wrote this document. One of the prime 
responsibilities of Congress is to pass a budget. From the original 
intent of our Constitution and what it says in the Constitution, the 
Congress should be making the budget, not the President.
  Article I lays out all of the premises of the Congress of the United 
States. Section 1 says all legislative powers herein granted shall be 
vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consistent of a 
Senate and House of Representatives.
  Section 2 goes on and talks about how the House is made up.
  Section 3 is about the Senate.
  Section 4 talks about the times and places and manner of holding 
elections for the same.
  Section 7 starts off: All bills for raising revenue shall originate 
in the House of Representatives, but the Senate may propose or concur 
with amendments as on other bills. That is the first sentence of 
article I, section 7.
  So all bills for raising revenue should start in the House. All 
budgets should be started in the House. And that's what our Founding 
Fathers meant to happen.
  Section 8 lists the 18 things that Congress can pass laws about. 
There are only 18, folks. Obviously, we are passing laws about many 
more things than 18. In fact, in this little booklet, the Constitution 
of the United States, article I, section 8, starts right here and it 
goes to right here. It is one and three-quarter pages. That's all 
Congress has the constitutional authority to pass laws about.
  And the 10th Amendment of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, says, 
and I want to read it to get it very clear so the American people can 
understand. It is basically one sentence. It says: The powers not 
delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by 
it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the 
people.
  In other words, Congress is only supposed to be doing the 18 things 
in article I, section 8. We specifically have enumerated powers. That 
is what limited government is supposed to be all about. It is supposed 
to be enumerated powers that we are given by the people. The 
Constitution starts off with very three powerful words: we the people. 
``We the people'' is the most powerful political force in this country 
under our Constitution.
  But ``we the people'' is not acting as strongly as it should have 
been. And one of the things that Congress is supposed to be doing is 
passing a budget. In fact, families all over this country, State and 
local governments all over this country, pass a budget. If we don't 
have a budget, how do we know how to set out bills proposing revenue? 
How do we know how to spend the money, the taxpayers' money that we 
take from them through taxes?
  Madam Speaker, we are doing a lot of things here in Congress that we 
shouldn't be doing. But one thing that we should be doing is passing a 
budget. It is critical. Mr. Goodlatte said during his 5-minute speech 
that he has introduced a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. 
I have done the same. Mine is a little different. There are three 
balanced budget amendments that Republicans have introduced. But how 
can we balance the budget if we don't have a budget? I believe very 
firmly that the Federal Government should not be spending any more 
money than it takes in year to year. We should be balancing our budget.
  My State of Georgia has to live under a balanced budget. In fact, the 
general assembly just dismissed a couple of weeks ago because they were 
desperately trying to balance their budget, which they eventually did, 
in this economic downturn. They were having tremendous struggles about 
how to cut the size of State government in the State of Georgia.
  But the Federal Government should be doing the same, and the American 
people need to demand a balanced budget. Republicans are going to be 
offering a balanced budget. We have done it over and over again. In 
1995, a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution passed the U.S. 
House of Representatives. It lacked one Republican vote in the U.S. 
Senate from being law today. Unfortunately, we could not get one 
Republican more to vote for a balanced budget amendment. We wouldn't be 
spending our grandchildren's future, as we are doing today. The 
outrageous spending that Congress is doing has to stop. The American 
people need to demand a balanced budget, but we need to demand from our 
elected representatives a budget.
  It puzzles me why almost at the end of May, Congress still has not 
enacted a budget resolution and has totally disregarded the April 15 
deadline. The deadline. We have missed that deadline, as we miss a lot 
of things around here.
  But we have seen over and over again big bills, big spending bills, a 
stimulus bill that has been an abject failure. It has stimulated 
government; it has not stimulated jobs in the private sector but very 
minimally. Most of those are temporary jobs. We see unemployment 
recently was reported at 9.9 percent; but that doesn't tell the whole 
story. Over 50 million people, workers in America, are out of work 
today. We have had a rise in the unemployment rate, but the 9.9 percent 
does not tell the true story.
  I was talking to one of the county commission chairmen in my district 
just a few weeks ago. And he said: Paul, in our county the unemployment 
rate today is 10.7 percent; and 1 year ago it was 14.3 percent.
  I said: Man, that is great. Where did the jobs come from? Where did 
you create all of the jobs in this county?
  He said: Paul, sadly, there are no jobs. We have not created new jobs 
here. People have just fallen off the rolls. They have gotten 
discouraged and are not on the unemployment rolls any more. In Georgia, 
we have furloughed teachers. At the University of Georgia that I 
represent in Athens, Georgia, we have furloughed a lot of the employees 
of the university. Teachers all across the State of Georgia are going 
to be put out of work because the State of Georgia just does not have 
the money in this economic downturn to continue to hire and continue to 
employ the teachers that we so desperately need.

                              {time}  1730

  We just had a resolution that we all voted on, almost unanimously, to 
honor teachers. Teachers hold the future of our Nation, because what 
they teach our children is critical for the

[[Page H3628]]

safety and prosperity of America. Teachers are being put out of work in 
Georgia, but they're being put out of work all over this country. We 
have too many people in the administration in the school system. 
Unfortunately, teachers are losing their jobs and administrators are 
keeping their jobs.
  But we absolutely have to have a budget. We absolutely must have 
something, a framework of how Congress is going to spend the taxpayers' 
hard-earned money. And Congress is ignoring the immediate budget 
picture. But we've also punted the long-term budgeting decisions to a 
deficit commission that is structured to avoid transparency and 
accountability. And it looks like we're not going to pass a budget 
resolution here in the House nor in the Senate. We may not even pass 
any appropriations bill.
  But tonight we're asking, Where is the budget? It's nowhere to be 
found. I've been just joined by my good friend, Congressman Jim Jordan, 
who is very much part of the Budget Committee and has been a stalwart 
in fighting for a budget that makes sense and informing Members, on our 
side at least, about the budget and what's going on. And he's here 
joining us, and hopefully we'll have some other Members.
  I see Marsha Blackburn, a stalwart conservative Congresswoman from 
Tennessee, from Nashville, a good friend, has joined us, and I 
appreciate you all joining us here tonight.
  And so I want to yield time to Mr. Jordan. And tell us about the 
budget. Where is the budget?
  Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. Where is the budget?
  I thank the gentleman for yielding, thank him for taking the time to 
do this Special Order this evening on a critical, critical issue.
  You know, April 15, by law, the Congress is supposed to have a budget 
resolution in place. We're supposed to have a document that actually 
places the parameters, sets the framework for all the spending that the 
Federal Government plans to do. And yet, here we are, 5 weeks later, 
still no budget. And, frankly, all the talk from the Democrats in 
Congress is that they're not going to do a budget resolution.
  Look, families have to do a budget. Small business owners have to do 
a budget. Local school boards do a budget. Village councils do a 
budget. Mayors and city councils, States, everyone has to do a budget. 
But somehow the Federal Government, the biggest spender of money in the 
world, is not going to put a plan together.
  Who'd have ever thought we'd see this day? I mean, think about this 
past year. Who would have ever imagined we'd see the things that we 
have witnessed from this Congress? Talk about a VAT tax, talk about a--
you know, a $1.4 trillion deficit. Did you ever think we'd see that in 
America, a $12 trillion national debt?
  And again, the talk of not even putting a budget together.
  Look, when the President--part of the reason I think the Democrats 
don't want to actually do that document and show the American people 
where they plan on spending their money is because the budget we got 
from the White House was so ridiculous. The budget from the White House 
that the President sent to Congress, sent to the Budget Committee, we 
heard testimony from the various Federal agencies. The budget they 
sent, by Budget Director Orszag's own testimony, was unsustainable 
because it ran deficits anywhere from 7 to 10 percent of GDP each and 
every year of the 9-year budget window. And so it's no wonder they 
don't want to deal with that document. It's no wonder they don't want 
to put together their own budget.
  But, frankly, you shouldn't be able to take a pass. Families, 
taxpayers, business owners out there, they don't get to take a pass. 
They have to put their budget together, and the Federal Government 
should do no less.
  You know, last year the RSC offered a balanced budget, a budget that 
actually got to balance. We're working on that document again. We plan 
to bring it forward. We plan to lay out there what a balanced budget 
looks like, what fiscal responsibility looks like. We plan to do what 
families and small business owners have to do.
  So it's a troublesome day. It's a sad day today when we have here the 
Congress of the United States not doing their responsibility and not 
putting together a budget document.
  I yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Jordan, you're exactly 
right. And I'd like for you to talk about the Republican balanced 
budget that we introduced last year and again you're working on it this 
year.
  But you brought up the President's budget. Todd Akin, our colleague 
from Missouri, was very generous to loan me this chart. This is about 
the President's proposed budget that he gave us. We don't have a House 
budget. We may not get a Senate budget.
  This pie chart, I just want to pay attention to two figures. Total 
receipts proposed, $2.56 trillion. Total outlays, $3.834 trillion. Now, 
$1 trillion is a lot. People can't get their arms around or mind around 
what's $1 trillion. But if you subtract 2.5, in receipts, plus change 
from 3.8 plus change, you see we have a big budget deficit that's been 
proposed by this administration. This is actually unsustainable.
  I've heard our colleagues on the other side talk over and over again 
about the deficit that was created by George Bush. And, in fact, all I 
hear from our colleagues over and over again is about the deficit, and 
they're still blaming the Bush administration.
  Well, I've not been a great fan of the budget deficits that the Bush 
administration put forward, but if we look at this chart, these are the 
deficits under the Democratic budgets. This is in billions of dollars. 
We see in blue the deficits, 2004, 5, 6, 7, that were under the Bush 
administration. We did have budget deficits, and that was wrong, 
absolutely wrong. The Federal Government should live within the means 
that it has. But look at this paltry amount compared to the budgets 
that have been proposed by this administration and others.
  And you hear over and over again the Obama budget--of course, this 
goes out from 2011 to 2020. These are the proposed budget deficits that 
the Obama administration has proposed in his budget. Huge, compared to 
the budget deficits that were actual under the Bush administration. We 
shouldn't even have had those. We should have been living under a 
balanced budget since 1995. And I blame the Bush administration and the 
Republican Congress for--control of Congress for these budgets. But 
this graph right here was when Nancy Pelosi took over as Speaker of the 
House. We've got to stop this outrageous spending.
  I want to yield to my good friend Marsha Blackburn from Nashville, 
Tennessee, who represents a huge swath through the middle of Tennessee, 
and she's a great warrior on this issue. And I want to welcome you, 
Mrs. Blackburn.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Thank you, and I want to thank the gentleman for 
yielding.
  And my wonderful district that goes from Memphis to Nashville and all 
the way to the Kentucky border, of course, right now we're fighting 
floods, and so many of our residents have been, are suffering the 
adverse effects of all of those floods. And we remember them every day 
and want to let them know that we're thinking about them.

  I'm glad that we're talking about the budget issue because budgets 
are to lay out the priorities of the Federal Government, and they're to 
define for our taxpayers and our constituents where this money is going 
to be spent. And as the gentleman just said, it is our responsibility. 
This is supposed to be done. Congress is charged with having control of 
the purse of the Federal Government, and we are to do this, as the 
gentleman said, by April 15 every year.
  Now, what some of my constituents are asking me, as we talk about 
fiscal responsibility, is: Why aren't they doing a budget this year? 
What are they afraid of? And what is the reason that they would choose 
not to do a budget?
  Because budgets are to outline those priorities, and they're to be a 
roadmap. And you know what is so interesting is so many of our 
constituents like following the budget process. When we send that link 
to the President's budget, when we send that link through our Blackburn 
Report to the budget document that the House has under consideration, 
they follow it, and they like to see where their taxpayer dollars are 
being spent.
  I had one constituent who said, you know, I think this is so 
disrespectful of

[[Page H3629]]

the American taxpayer that they would, in their arrogance, say, Trust 
us. We don't have to do a budget document. Just trust us. We're going 
to keep spending. We're not going to curtail our spending. Just trust 
us.
  And the American people are listening to that, and they're saying, 
You've got to be kidding.
  As Mr. Jordan said, you know, families do this, small businesses, 
everybody's been tightening their belts. Our colleges, our 
universities, our counties and our cities, they're all doing their 
budget hearings right now, and they're perplexed that Congress would 
consider moving forward.
  Now, the gentleman from Georgia talked a little bit about past 
spending. And I think as we talk about deficits and the debt, that the 
gentleman from Georgia and I probably agree that--and I know I 
certainly talked with President Bush and I think he did, too, many 
times. I felt that President Bush spent too much.
  CBO says when you look at the years of Republican control from 1994 
to 2006, our average annual deficit was about $104 billion per year. 
And then you go in, and the gentleman has the chart that shows what 
happened when there was Democrat control of Congress, the 3 years that 
they have had it, 2007, 2008, 2009.
  Well, our $104 billion a year deficit, which was way too much--we 
should never have a deficit, or it should only be in extenuating 
circumstances. We all support a balanced budget. We support a balanced 
budget amendment. We support bringing that in, like the RSC did last 
year, having a balanced budget.
  But when you look at the fact that $104 billion, as opposed to $1.11 
trillion, which has been their average annual deficit, it causes people 
to say, My goodness. You mean our average annual deficit has become 
their monthly deficit?
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Say that again so the people who are listening 
can understand that, if you would, please, won't you.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Our average, under Republican control, the average 
annual deficit has become what now, under Democrat control, they are 
running in deficit averaging on a month. And I think that's what causes 
concern to people.
  April, the deficit was four times what it was last year. These are 
numbers that cause people to say, Wait a minute. We have to put the 
brakes on. We are on the wrong track, and it is time for Washington to 
get its fiscal house in order.
  You know, one of the things that I will ask when someone says, Well, 
we need to be spending more on this and we need to be spending more on 
that; people need to be paying more in taxes so that the Federal 
Government can spend more, is, Well, how much is enough when it comes 
to taxes? How much is ever going to be enough? How much spending is 
ever going to be enough?
  And those are questions that, when you stop and think about it, is 
there ever going to be a time when those that want to spend taxpayer 
money get enough?
  I think we would all agree, Washington does not have a revenue 
problem. Washington has a spending problem. And the way we begin to get 
the spending under control is to have a budget that is going to spend 
less. That is going to be the first step.
  Now, the gentleman from Georgia had the charts, and he was talking 
about an estimated, I think it's $2.3 trillion in revenues and the $3.8 
trillion in outlays, and that was the budget that the President had 
proposed.
  And I ask the gentleman, do I have my figures correct? $2.3 trillion 
and change for the revenues and $3.8 trillion and change for the 
expenditures?

                              {time}  1745

  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. According to this chart, you are close; it is 
$2.567 trillion in revenues, and then $3.834 trillion in outlays.
  I yield back.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  We know that since the time that that budget was presented to us we 
have passed a health care bill. And we know that last week even CBO 
came back and said guess what, we misfigured. We are going to change 
these projections. So already those expenditure and outlay projections 
are off because we have the trillion dollar-plus health care bill that 
we are going to be looking at.
  That is something that certainly is on the minds of the taxpayers. 
They want to see the out of control spending stop. And I think that 
they are sending a message loud and clear. The focus should be on the 
economy. It should be on jobs. Constituents every day are saying, Where 
are the jobs? You have stimulated big government, but you haven't 
stimulated Main Street. Where are the jobs? And they are focused on the 
out of control spending from Washington on programs they do not want. 
And they know that not only they the taxpayer, we the people cannot 
afford, but the Federal Government cannot afford to be spending our 
money on those programs.
  I yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Thank you, Ms. Blackburn.
  You are exactly right. Not only did we have the health care bill that 
was passed by this House, passed by the Senate first and then came over 
here, not one Republican voted for that bill. We just heard from CBO 
just this last week I think it was when they said, Oops, we made a 
mistake. It's going to cost at least $115 billion more than we first 
estimated. One hundred fifteen billion dollars more. That's not a 
paltry sum. And actually, it's going to still continue to climb. I 
think that the government takeover of health care is going to be an 
even bigger bill.
  We saw Congress pass a nonstimulus bill, which is what I called it at 
the time. That's been an abject failure. That's another trillion 
dollars that we don't have the money. We have seen bill after bill come 
to the floor of the House passed by the Democratic leadership, forced 
down the throats of the American people, with just outrageous spending 
of money that we just do not have. That's the bottom line. We have got 
to stop the spending, this outrageous spending. We need to have a 
budget. The Federal Government needs to live within its budget, period.
  Mr. Jordan, I yield to you.
  Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I just want to pick up where the gentlelady from Tennessee was 
talking about. She says it's irresponsible not to do a budget. It most 
certainly is. Thirty-four days and counting. April 15, here we are May 
19, 34 days the Federal Government hasn't done what the law tells us we 
are supposed to do in putting a budget resolution together. It is 
irresponsible, it is arrogant.
  It is arrogant to not go through the markup, not have the debate, not 
have the hearings, not put that out there so the American taxpayer, the 
American family, the American small business owner can see how in fact 
this government plans in fact to spend their money.
  But it is not just irresponsible, it is not just arrogant, it is 
immoral to do what this government is doing. It is just plain wrong to 
tell future generations of Americans, to tell our children and our 
grandchildren you are going to have to deal with a $12 trillion debt 
and counting and growing. You are going to have to pay that back. That 
is just plain wrong.
  I mean one of the things that makes our country so special, one of 
the things that makes America the greatest Nation ever is the simple 
concept that parents make sacrifices for their children so that when 
they become adults they have life better than we did. And then they in 
turn do it for their kids, and each generation has done it for the 
next, and we get to be America, the greatest Nation ever, the highest 
standard of living in human history. And now for the first time we have 
the political class in this town telling the next generation, telling 
future generations, You know what, we are going to live for the now, we 
are going to spend for the moment, we are going to live for the moment, 
and we are going to send the bill to you.
  It's not just arrogant and irresponsible; it is wrong. It is just 
plain wrong. This money has to be paid back. Way back in one of my 
first economics classes in college we learned a simple thing: There is 
no free lunch. You have to pay it back. Somebody's got to pay this 
back. And it shouldn't be put on the backs of our kids and our 
grandkids.

[[Page H3630]]

  Think about where we are at today. And as we talked about the budget 
that the Democrats are proposing, the budget that the President sent to 
Capitol Hill makes matters worse. But where we are at today, we have to 
pay this year $200 billion just in interest on the debt. Within a 
couple years the interest payments alone will be a billion dollars a 
day. So it is not just arrogant and irresponsible, it is immoral. It is 
just plain wrong to do this.
  That's why, because they are addicted to spending, they don't want to 
actually make cuts like we do in our budget. That's why they don't want 
to do this process. That's why they don't want to have a budget. And it 
is just, as I said, it is just plain wrong. And I appreciate the 
gentleman taking this hour to talk about this most fundamental issue, 
this most basic issue, and let people understand what in fact is really 
going on with their government today.
  With that I would yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Thank you, Mr. Jordan.
  I agree with Steny Hoyer, the majority leader for the Democratic 
Party here in the House. When he was talking about passing a final 
budget and a spending blueprint, he said this, quote: ``It is the most 
basic responsibility of governing.'' The Democratic leader, Steny 
Hoyer, said passing a final budget and a spending blueprint is the most 
basic responsibility of governing. They are not governing. They are not 
doing what they should.
  It is also real interesting to me, in 2006 the House Budget Committee 
chairman, John Spratt, said, quote, ``If you can't budget, you cannot 
govern.'' ``If you can't budget, you cannot govern.'' Quote and 
unquote. John Spratt, the Democratic chairman of the House Budget 
Committee. They are not governing. They are being irresponsible. The 
American public deserve better.
  We have been joined tonight also by my good friend from Texas who has 
been an individual that has spent many hours, as I have, here on the 
floor talking about the ObamaCare bill and about ethics in governing. 
We are very honored to have Judge John Carter from Texas.
  I yield to you.
  Mr. CARTER. I thank my friend for yielding.
  You know, some of the Members of this august body that are living 
just a normal life, they ought to be looking at this, and folks back 
home ought to be looking at this and thinking how can you spend all 
that money without having a budget? And then they think about what kind 
of a great deal would it be at my house if I could just say, you know 
what, kids, mom, I tell you what, let's do, let's just do whatever 
makes us happy. Let's pick up all the pet projects in the world that we 
favor and let's just spend our money on that. Let's go out and buy the 
things we want to buy. Let's go places we want to go and do things we 
want to do. And just throw that budget that we used to have, throw it 
in the trash, and this year let's don't budget. Let's spend the money. 
And hey, mom, I don't want you to worry that we don't have a budget 
because we don't need a budget. Hey, we will borrow the money to pay 
these bills. That's no problem. And if we can't get somebody to loan us 
the money here, we will go to China and get the people in China to loan 
us the money to pay these bills, and we will be fine.

  And oh, you are worried about paying it back? Hey, let the grandkids 
pay it back. You know, they are going to have a good life. Surely they 
are going to have a good life. And they don't need as good as we got. 
So let's let them pay it back, and let's put it on their shoulders. And 
if they are smart, they will figure out a way to stick it down on their 
grandkids' shoulders. And we will just keep this runaway spending going 
forever.
  I don't think that most people would see that as a way to run your 
household. Or the businessmen that are sitting down at the board 
meeting, and they are saying, you know, we had a budget last year, but 
this year let's throw that budget out and let's just do what we think 
is going to make us do well this year for ourselves personally, and 
let's don't worry about what's going to happen in the future because we 
will borrow the money from China, and then we will put it down the 
road, far enough down the road that we will get other people's 
grandkids to pay for it.
  That doesn't make sense. And it doesn't make sense to the American 
people. It means that you are just--and you know, I get really excited 
when I hear like I heard the other night, when I heard some of my 
colleagues from the other side over here talking about what a wonderful 
job they had done, and they talked about PAYGO. PAYGO has saved the 
world. My gosh, we have just absolutely saved the world with PAYGO 
because we are paying for what we are spending unless it's an 
emergency. And so far everything we have done we have declared an 
emergency on. So, well, we didn't quite get PAYGO done, but that's 
okay, we believe in it. And it's something we believe in.
  What we are hearing from folks back home is, hey, times are tough. We 
need jobs, and you are doing your little pet projects down there, and 
you are spending this money that we are never going to be able to pay 
back, or we are afraid we will never be able to pay back, and we don't 
want to be Greece. You know, poor Greece. Right now they are kind of 
the poster child for what happens when you don't pay your bills.
  Well, if you crunch the numbers and we continue down the road that 
the Obama administration is taking this country, at the rate of 
acceleration of deficit spending that the Obama administration has 
given us, and by the way last night there were some charts put up there 
and just conveniently the deficit numbers on those charts stopped at 
the end of the Bush administration, so we didn't get to see that other 
line that the Obama administration put on there that drops clear off 
the charts. There you go. That one didn't happen to be on the charts 
when we were told the figures never lie. So it stopped right there at 
2007. Let's look at it.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Let me reclaim my time and just explain this 
chart.
  Mr. CARTER. Because their chart would have been upside down because 
it was below the line.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. We can turn it upside down.
  Mr. CARTER. That's the way it ought to be. Turn it upside down.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. We will turn it upside down. And then we will 
be coming from the right to the left.
  Mr. CARTER. And we got to see last night all those Bush blue lines. 
And we did get to see the first little Obama line right there. But 
that's not an Obama line yet, that's just a Democratic Congress line.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. That's a Nancy Pelosi line right here.
  Mr. CARTER. That's a Nancy Pelosi line. And then look what's happened 
since. And so it's true, figures don't lie. You just don't show them 
all, it makes a little bit of a difference. So I am glad you got that 
chart out. I just brought it up because I kept wanting to go raise my 
hand and say, Aren't there supposed to be some more lines on there?
  But anyway, that's another story. Back to what our folks back home 
were saying. They are looking at that, and they are saying, Who is 
going to pay for that? Well, it would be their grandchildren and our 
grandchildren and our colleagues across the aisle's grandchildren. I 
personally don't have any yet, but I am praying every night to have 
some grandchildren. When I do, I certainly don't want to start them out 
behind the eight ball.
  In fact, we most of the time work to try to make sure that we start 
our kids out ahead of where we started out if we can, just like our 
friend Mr. Jordan said a minute ago. And that's kind of what makes 
America great. Now, there are people that say, well, we have been 
deficit spending forever. But you know, these numbers we see here are 
on new ideas and new concepts. We don't see the threats, the outside 
threats the American people face, like the wars and so forth, being 
that big number. This is new energy, which may be a great idea, but 
thus far it's not replacing the energy we have got. And it's new 
projects and it's new concepts of, what I would call in nice language, 
a centrist form of government. And what we are really seeing here is a 
group of folks running amok with spending and not even being willing to 
do what their leader said the most basic responsibility of governing 
is, to have a budget.

[[Page H3631]]

  Well, why didn't they do that? Well, I think it's because we are too 
busy doing pet projects and making sure that we change America. It's 
more important to change than it is to get it right.

                              {time}  1800

  And I think that's a question we need to be asking ourselves. We 
didn't know what ``change'' meant. Now we're starting to get a glimmer 
of what change means. And is that the change we want?
  I yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. I appreciate it.
  I just wanted to put in my two cents about the question you just 
asked about why the Budget Committee hasn't passed out a budget, why 
the House hasn't passed a budget. We have an April 15 deadline by law. 
A budget is supposed to be passed. The Senate hasn't passed a budget. 
We've been very busy this whole year, you know, Mr. Carter, since this 
year started under this administration. We've passed all of these big 
spending bills, and it is my belief that we don't have a Federal budget 
because they can't balance the budget. They can't show to the American 
people how awful the spending is up here, how outrageous, how egregious 
the irresponsibility is, and they do not want anybody to hold them 
responsible.
  My 19-year-old son, Collins Broun, comes to me when he needs some 
money. And he's been in school. He's a freshman in college. And he's 
had some little jobs, but he doesn't have a budget because he depends 
on me to provide his needs.
  Well, this government is relying on taxpayers, and the PAYGO, Mr. 
Carter, that you were talking about that we keep hearing touted by the 
Blue Dogs on their side about how great it is. We've suspended PAYGO 
over and over again on a health care bill the American public still 
doesn't want. They want it repealed. We, as Republicans, want to repeal 
and replace it. There's been a nonstimulus bill that's been an abject 
failure that's going to be over a trillion dollars. This has created 
some government jobs and some temporary jobs, but hasn't stimulated the 
private sector.
  Most jobs that were created in the private sector were small 
business. Businesses are scared to death. They are not creating any new 
jobs because they look at these budget deficits and see spending bills 
that this Democratic Congress has been passing over and over again--
most times without any or sometimes with only very minimal Republican 
votes for them. But we've seen just over and over again these huge 
bills. They haven't taken the time. And I don't think they want to be 
held responsible, frankly. So I think that's a big part of the reason.
  So to answer your question, I think that this Congress won't pass a 
budget in the House, probably not in the Senate because they don't want 
to be held responsible. They want to continue to do what even the 
majority leader said. It's the most basic responsibility of government. 
They are not doing it. John Spratt said if you cannot budget, you 
cannot govern. Well, they're not governing. All they're doing is 
spending.
  Mr. CARTER. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. I'll yield back to Mr. Carter.
  Mr. CARTER. One of the reasons you have a budget is so you can make 
legitimate estimates on how much you're going to spend. If you don't 
make a budget, you're not tied to a legitimate estimate and what your 
revenues are going to be coming in to pay for it. That's what you do to 
make a budget. Everybody back home knows that.
  I'm not going to mention the company, but it was a good-size company. 
I met with one of their folks the other day, and they just finished 
charting out at their board of directors at just what increasing the 
health care costs for covering the 26 year olds, in other words, 
carrying the children of their employees to 26 years old, what it was 
going to cost their company.
  Now, they're a good-size company--$28 million. Now that's missing it 
just a little bit, isn't it, for one company is looking at $28 million 
just to carry children to 26 years old?
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Above what they're spending now.
  Mr. CARTER. Above what they're spending now on their health 
insurance.
  Now, I don't care how big you are. That's a big chunk of money, and 
it would shock anybody from the biggest corporation in the world down 
to the little mom-and-pop to have that kind of percentage of your 
revenues all of a sudden by government action going out the front door.
  That's the kind of thing when you don't think things through and 
figure out what it's going to cost that those things jump up and bite 
you. But in this instance when we don't figure out what it's going to 
cost, it's the American people that get jumped up and bitten, and 
that's what I think we're seeing happen right now. And I think that's 
unfortunate.
  I yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. I agree with you it's not only unfortunate, but 
it's irresponsible.
  We're seeing Congress spend money, tons and tons of money that we 
don't have, trillions of dollars that we don't have, for programs that 
America doesn't want. It's not in the best interest of America. It's 
killing jobs. Killing jobs. And it's just not responsible governing.
  We've been joined also tonight by my good friend from New Orleans, 
Louisiana, Steve Scalise, who's also been a great fighter for us here 
on the floor on many issues--on health care and other issues. And I 
want to welcome Mr. Scalise, and I'd like to hear you impart some 
knowledge in this.
  Mr. SCALISE. I thank my colleague and the gentleman from Georgia, and 
I appreciate you bringing this issue to the forefront because what 
we're talking about here is responsibility.
  And Speaker Pelosi, when she took the gavel 3\1/2\ years ago--she's 
been Speaker for 3\1/2\ years--and they talked about doing things 
differently. They laid out all kinds of promises. They bashed 
Republicans for being fiscally irresponsible. And yet all we've seen 
from Speaker Pelosi and her liberal lieutenants who are running this 
Congress is spending at unprecedented levels. This year a trillion and 
a half dollars. They're breaking records every day on deficit spending 
that is being dumped onto the backs of our children and our 
grandchildren, denying opportunity to the next generation.
  And yet when you look at what families are doing across this 
country--these are tough economic times. People are looking to 
Washington saying, Where are the jobs? Why isn't Washington focused on 
creating jobs?
  And we've come up with ideas and solutions that we've put on the 
table to create jobs, to cut taxes, things that have been proven to 
work to get the economy back on track, and every time we've been turned 
away. And yet when families are tightening their belts, they're pulling 
back. They're cutting their budgets.
  Our States: in Louisiana, in my State, we've got a Governor right 
now, our Governor's cutting the budget to balance it. They're going to 
balance the budget this year even though it's tough economic times, 
like most States are doing. And like most families are doing. And 
Washington seems to be the only place where they not only don't get it, 
but at a time when everybody else is cutting back and tightening their 
belts to live within their means, Washington's spending out of control 
in record levels.
  And now, as you pointed out, they haven't even brought a budget to 
this House floor for next year. No budget. Haven't even brought a 
budget. Now, we think they should bring a balanced budget. In fact, 
we've proposed a balanced budget. They haven't even brought a budget, 
any budget.

  Maybe you'd say, well, maybe it's because Congress is so busy dealing 
with so many important issues and creating jobs and all of these other 
things. Unfortunately, that's not the case. They brought the government 
takeover of health care. They had time for that. Something that's going 
to run millions of jobs out of this country, billions of dollars in new 
taxes. They brought this cap-and-trade energy tax, a tax that would add 
thousands of dollars to every family's electricity bill.
  Just look at today's agenda. My colleague from Georgia, as he points 
out, they haven't brought the budget. You say, well, maybe that's 
because there's

[[Page H3632]]

a lot of things on the agenda other than a budget that is so important. 
Let's look at some of the votes we took on the House floor today. We 
named a post office. We congratulated a basketball team. In fact, we 
even honored a courthouse. Honored a courthouse. That's what was on the 
agenda of the United States House of Representatives today.
  And yet they haven't even brought a budget to this floor--not only a 
balanced budget like we think they should bring, but the President's 
budget--the only document that's sitting out there. The President's 
budget doubles the national debt in 5 years. Doubles it.
  Now, we want to say rein in that spending. Rein it in. Stop this out-
of-control spending.
  They started last year with the stimulus bill, $787 billion of money 
that we don't have. But they said, Oh, it needs to happen so we don't 
exceed 8 percent unemployment. Well, today we're sitting at 9.9 percent 
unemployment. It just keeps going up. Millions more Americans have lost 
their jobs in the year and a half that President Obama has been 
President, Speaker Pelosi has been running the House, Harry Reid's 
running the Senate. They control all of government. And all you see is 
out-of-control spending, more lost jobs, and hundreds of billions of 
dollars in new taxes. And you wonder why businesses in this country are 
afraid to hire or afraid to invest, why families are scared to death 
looking not only at their own pocketbooks, but more concerned with what 
Washington's doing to deny them, and especially our children and 
grandchildren, more opportunities.
  So I think we need to keep this focus up. We need to address this 
problem. We need to balance our budget.
  I yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Thank you, Mr. Scalise. You're absolutely 
right. The budget resolution simply sets forth an annual framework of 
priorities, sets forth the framework for taxes and spending. It's one 
of the few pieces of legislation that Congress must pass annually. 
We're not seeing that happen.
  Since 1974 when Congress passed the Congressional Budget Act, which 
created the modern budget process, Congress has failed to enact a 
budget resolution only four times since 1974. This year will be the 
fifth. But it's the first time in history, the first time in history 
that the House does not make any attempt whatsoever, no attempt, to 
pass a first version of a budget bill--never since 1974 when the 
Congressional Budget Act was passed. That's just unconscionable.
  Mr. CARTER. Will the gentleman yield for a question?
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Absolutely.
  Mr. CARTER. So if I understand you, those other budgets you're 
talking about, those four others, there was--in those cases there was 
an attempt to pass a budget, but they never could reconcile. Maybe they 
couldn't reconcile the differences with the Senate or they couldn't 
even reconcile it within the Congress, but they certainly made a good-
faith effort to try to get a budget passed and didn't get it done. Is 
that what you're saying?
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. That's absolutely correct. In fact, an attempt 
was made to pass a budget. Through our legislative process, they did 
all of the things. A budget resolution was presented, an attempt was 
made to pass a budget resolution. And only four times since 1974 has a 
budget resolution not passed. But this is the first time in history 
that there is no attempt whatsoever to even pass a first version of a 
budget in the U.S. House. It's unconscionable.
  I yield back.
  Mr. CARTER. It seems to me you ought to at least try. I mean, it's 
almost like, you know, my wife, one time my son wanted to know--he had 
to drop out of baseball to play football, and he wanted to go back and 
play baseball. And he was all hanging around the house all moping 
around. And his mother said, Well, you know what? If you don't try, the 
answer is ``no.'' So why don't you go ask the coach if he will let you 
back on the baseball team.
  Well, I'd say to the Budget Committee of the majority party, if 
you're not even going to give it a try, of course we're not going to 
have a budget. Let's at least give it a try. Let's at least see if we 
can't come up with an idea.
  And I kind of like Mr. Scalise's idea of this time let's try to put a 
balanced budget before the American people and see what happens there.
  You know, it was the Republicans back during the Clinton 
administration that battled and battled and battled Bill Clinton who 
vetoed and vetoed until they finally got their consent of a balanced 
budget amendment done. They had a route for a balanced budget, and they 
fought the administration until they got it there. And it had a lot to 
do with some of the prosperity that took place in that decade. That 
seems to be lost in history. Revisionist history is actually current 
event in this place. It's constantly changing what really happened, 
when things really happened.
  The welfare reform was really done by the Congress, but somehow that 
got forgotten. There's a lot that gets forgotten. And right now they're 
forgetting to do a budget, and it's time for the Democratic Party and 
their leadership and this House to do a budget and it would go forward 
and let us see just what you're going to spend and where the revenue is 
coming from. I think it's only logical that they go forward on that.
  I yield back.

                              {time}  1815

  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Well, thank you for yielding back.
  What are the consequence of not passing a budget? Well, first thing 
if we don't pass the budget, then there's no cap on discretionary 
spending for this fiscal year. So they can spend whatever they want to 
because they have no constraints within a budget.
  I've got a friend whose wife said, Well, we have got plenty of money 
in the bank. I still have checks in my checkbook.
  Mr. CARTER. I've heard that before.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. That's the way this majority is acting. They 
still have the checks in the checkbook. They still have a credit card 
that is being held by the Chinese.
  But where does the money come from? With all this deficit spending, 
this outrageous spending that Congress has been doing, it is going to 
come from our children and great-grandchildren. They are going to live 
at a lower standard than we live today, be the first generation that 
has lived at a lower standard than the previous generation, and it is 
because of this ``gimme now'' attitude that this Congress, under the 
leadership of Nancy Pelosi, has been doing.
  So passing a budget will at least help stop this outrageous spending 
and will put some caps, maybe, on the discretionary spending for this 
year.
  Also, not passing a budget means that Congress will not muster the 
leadership to set any kind of framework for paring back the entitlement 
spending. We have got to control entitlement spending.
  Our colleague who is the ranking member on the Budget Committee, Paul 
Ryan, introduced a bill in the last Congress, in the 110th where you 
and I both were here, that would set forth some parameters for 
controlling entitlement spending. We have got to do that. There is no 
question. In fact, about two-thirds of the Federal budget is on 
autopilot, and it just continues to grow exponentially.
  We have got to change the whole budgetary process, and that is what I 
hope to see us do. And I think Republicans have that as part of what we 
want to do once we get control back of the House, is to change the 
budgetary process so that we balance our budget and we control 
entitlement spending. It is absolutely critical.
  But thirdly, most importantly, not passing a budget means not carving 
out priorities for the spending and giving us an extension of the tax 
cuts that were put in in 2001 and 2002, even for low-income families. 
So we are going to see tremendous increases in taxes for everybody in 
this country, even the people who can afford it the least, those on 
limited incomes, fixed incomes, and the poorest people in this country.
  In fact, we hear over and over again that our Democratic colleagues 
are interested in the middle class; but, actually, the middle class and 
the lower economic rungs of the ladder are going to be hit hardest by 
the health care bill that was passed, ObamaCare, by the nonstimulus 
bill that's been an abject

[[Page H3633]]

failure, and all the outrageous spending that our Democratic colleagues 
have been doing here in the Congress.
  Beyond all these things, not passing a budget signals to the American 
people that we are not going to be held accountable. We are not going 
to deal with the Nation's spending addiction that Congress has, the 
deficit challenges that this government has.
  We have got to stop it.
  Families all over this country are balancing their budgets. My State 
of Georgia and many States have to live under a balanced budget. I 
believe the Federal Government should live under a balanced budget. But 
we are not even having a budget.
  Mr. Carter, what do you think we are going to do? Are we going to 
continue spending? I yield.
  Mr. CARTER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  These are serious times, and we have serious issues to deal with.
  Recently, I was privileged to be in a meeting with some conservative 
economists, and I say that because I want to make sure that we are 
pretty clear they are conservative. They gave us a whole bunch of 
projections of spending and projections of debt-to-income, both 
government debt and private debt to GDP and bank deposits. And they 
said, but cutting through the chase is, if we continue the policies of 
the Obama administration into a second term, if he wins a second term, 
in the third year of his second term we will be Greece. That is pretty 
serious.
  And, you know, you talked about the middle class. I bet if you 
questioned everybody that lost their job and is out of work and what 
class they were in, they would all tell you they were in the middle 
class, because we all consider ourselves to be middle class in this 
country. We are sort of proud to be middle class.
  So these concepts require work, and that means a budget.
  I yield back.
  Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Thank you, Mr. Carter.
  Just in closing, in the last minute that we have, Americans know that 
you can't manage what you can't measure. If you don't have a budget, 
you can't measure anything. You can't set out spending priorities. 
Failing to enact a budget blueprint just doesn't allow Congress to 
measure any spending priorities that we see coming forth, and just see 
big spending after big spending bills.
  Democrats are purposefully deciding to not pass a budget bill 
blueprint to hide the fact that our country's financial picture is in 
terrible shape and we are going down the same road that Greece is going 
down.
  American families know that this is irresponsible. Congress needs to 
get its house in order and lead. It can start by passing a responsible 
budget resolution. American people need to ask: Where is the budget?

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